Gunmen killed at least six people in a spate of attacks across Iraq on Sunday, including a suicide car bombing at a checkpoint in the northern province of Kirkuk, security officials said. A bomber slammed his explosives-filled car into the checkpoint where a group of youngsters had gathered to be taken to a police recruitment centre, Kirkuk deputy chief of police Major General Torhan Yussef told AFP.
Three people were killed and six injured when a roadside bomb blasted a minibus in the village of Al-Murjana, 100 kilometres northwest of Baquba, the capital of Diyala province, police said.
In the capital itself, gunmen killed Brigadier General Adel Abbas, a senior officer in the interior ministry's criminal investigation department, as he was driving to work, security officials said. Abbas was killed near his home in Baghdad's Hail Adel neighbourhood, the officials said, adding that his driver was wounded.
Gunmen also tried to kill Ghasan Ridha, a director in the finance ministry, by planting a bomb in his car in Baghdad. Ridha was wounded in the attack.
In Baghdad's Waziriyah neighbourhood, seven people including three Iraqi soldiers were hurt when their patrol was hit by a roadside bomb near the Turkish embassy, security officials said. And in the north of the city, a similar attack targeting a police patrol wounded five more people including a policeman, they added.
